Archive for the ‘furry classics’ category

The other day I went to a drive-up window to buy a lousy $4 ice cream, since in the year of the plague, walk-in much less full restaurant service are but memories. Reaching the front of the line, I discovered to my chagrin that the establishment wasn’t accepting cash, but only credit or debit cards. Cash, it would seem, is now considered a “contact point” for the Coronavirus, which can live merrily on a variety of surfaces for hours.

As I fumbled awkwardly for my debit card out of my wallet, the thought surfaced in my mind that these must be terrible times to be Scrooge McDuck. I mean, that bird would literally go swimming through his cash vaults! He had, by a Forbes estimate, a net cash worth of over 44 billion dollars. Swimming and burrowing through his money brought this duck pleasure! He was, by the standards of many, one lucky duck…

Now in these plague years, could Scrooge be considered to have a fatal attraction to money, considering his physicality with it? With money being considered filthy lucre, does Scrooge McDuck have a death wish, or is he just severely conflicted now about his practices? Is an intervention needed to save this duck from himself?! These thoughts eat away at me, terribly. We may never know the answer to these timely questions, but press on nonetheless. It is our calling, our mission here… 🐺

“Cats,” the movie version based on the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical upcoming in December of 2019, promises to be one of those things that you will either love, or passionately hate. Previously the studio had released little information about the film other than that it was coming out in December. A trailer is now available of the film, and reactions run to polarizing extremes with either praise or excoriation .

“This is not a cat,” huffs one, “this is an abomination!”Other descriptions have included the terms horrifying and terrifying. Why, you may ask, do some people freak out so badly over the early images from Cats? The answer might lie in the fact that they are not comfortable with the idea of anthropomorphic animals, which in this case involves a blend of live action and CGI animation. The cats in Cats have human mouths, teeth, and lips blended in with their furry faces along with human hands, and this seems to creep some people out to no end. Some of the cats wear clothing and others do not, with the female felines who do not showing breast swellings. The cats also have tails that move and sway, which seems to have phallic connotations for some viewers. Anthropomorphic representations of the animal characters also seemed to disturb viewers of the Sonic (the Hedgehog) movie.

Those things being said, the cats of Cats move with ballet-like feline grace and are quite engaging once disbelief and initial astonishment is suspended; they show distinct personalities and a variety of moods. The cats are shrunk down to their appropriate proportional size in their environments, and are not human-sized even if bearing some human features. The cast is stellar, and includes Taylor Swift, Jennifer Hudson, Idris Elba, and even Ian McKellan…yes, the actor who played Magneto is playing a cat! When Jennifer Hudson opens up with her powerhouse voice to sing Memories, time seems to stand still.

I’m hardly objective about all of this, being a furry myself. I could fit easily into this world, but I can understand the discomfort of those who cannot. This is entertainment, after all…consider it as something different, not as an affront to reality; you may like it, and it might even grow on you. Cats the movie is likely to be a big hit for the holidays, with viewers likely to love it, hate it, or simply shrug and say, “that was weird.” Such was the reaction to the original musical, which ultimately became wildly popular. A tale based upon anthropomorphic cats who sit about introducing themselves until one of them dies is weird by nature, and likely to provoke fur-vor on both sides…

Adult entertainer Stormy Daniels (linked with The Orange Man) recently appeared in my home state, donning her Little Red Riding Hood outfit for one of her sets. I have included the least revealing image of this outfit that I could find because we do try to run a semi-respectable blog here. I understand that the hood along with other things is lowered at some point further into the performance. This is not to say that I don’t like to see the classics promoted, ahem!

But Ms. Daniels aside, the thoughts which filled my head when I heard of this performance were of Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs 1966 classic, Li’l Red Riding Hood. This song never gets old for me, and I love to revisit it occasionally. As late as the year 2000 Sam the Sham was still performing the number, and his howl remained in fine shape. It’s hard to hear the song without resisting the temptation to howl, and I fall prey to that temptation easier than most.

No, I did not see Ms. Daniels’ interpretation of Little Red, although when asked about it someone who was there offered his opinion that the performance wasn’t worth $140,000…Owwwl!